Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s move to ban a critical news website from covering the presidential palace is a threat to press freedom, rights and media groups said on Wednesday.Rappler, set up in 2012, is among a clutch of Philippine news organisations that have sparred with Duterte over their critical coverage of his drug war which the government says has claimed the lives of nearly 4,000 suspects.Human rights groups charge that thousands more have been killed by shadowy ...

Philippine officials are headed to Kuwait on Thursday to seek greater protection for migrant workers after a diplomatic row over the alleged mistreatment of Filipinos in the Gulf state.Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello told reporters Wednesday one of his deputies would lead the delegation, which is also due to stop in Saudi Arabia and Qatar to urge reforms.Topping the list are demands that Filipino workers be allowed to keep their cellphones and passports, which can be confiscated by employers.The ...

More than a hundred relatives and supporters of a Filipina maid whose body was found stuffed in a freezer in Kuwait brandished banners demanding justice as her coffin was returned home on Saturday.The family of Joanna Demafelis openly wept as the white casket was unloaded at an airport cargo terminal in the central city of Iloilo."Justice for Joanna D. Demafelis," was emblazoned on banners and on T-shirts worn by the crowd which included a congressman and local officials expressing ...

The Philippines Monday expanded a ban on its citizens working in Kuwait after President Rodrigo Duterte angrily lashed out at the Gulf state over reports of Filipino workers suffering abuse and exploitation. Authorities say 252,000 Filipinos work in Kuwait, many as maids. They are among over two million employed in the region, whose remittances are a lifeline to the Philippine economy. But Labour Secretary Silvestre Bello Monday announced a "total ban" on new employment in the country, ...

Interpol is tracking the employers of Joanna Daniela Demafelis, a Filipino worker whose body was found in a freezer in Kuwait. The employers were identified as Nader Issam Assaf, Lebanese, and his wife, Mona Hassoun, Syrian. The body of Demafelis, who arrived to work for the couple in Kuwait in 2014, was found in the couple’s freezer at their home in Kuwait’s Hawally. Assaf, his wife and two children fled Kuwait in November 2016. The apartment’s owner only recently got a ...

More than 2,200 Filipinos are ready to take up President Rodrigo Duterte’s offer to repatriate workers from Kuwait due to reports of abuse, the Philippine labor minister said on Sunday. Duterte asked Philippine Airlines and Cebu Pacific on Friday to provide flights for Filipinos who want to leave Kuwait, after the body of a Filipino worker was found in a freezer of an abandoned apartment. “We have been informed that as of Friday there were 2,200-plus ...

The Kuwaiti Foreign Ministry is seeking final solutions to the possible ban of Filipino workers going to the country after President Duterte condemned them of mistreating his ‘countrymen’, Kuwaiti media outlets reported.A local Kuwaiti newspaper cited diplomatic sources saying that any solution should be in accordance with diplomatic channels, away from media hype.The sources added that Kuwaiti authorities provided the criminal reports of seven cases of violence and murders of ...

The family of Joanna Daniela Demafelis, a Filipino worker whose body was found in a freezer in Kuwait, is demanding justice. “I am appealing for government's help in seeking justice for my daughter's death," the victim's mother Eva Demafelis was quoted as saying by ABS-CBN News. Demafelis travelled to Kuwait in 2014 to support her family and she last spoke to them between 2016 and 2017. “Kuwaiti authorities have yet to determine when Demafelis died. Initial investigation found ...

The Philippines will ask its private airlines to evacuate its nationals from Kuwait within 72 hours after the discovery of a Filipino migrant worker dead in a freezer, the latest in what Manila calls a pattern of abuse in the Gulf state. An emotional President Rodrigo Duterte live on television showed graphic photos of the body of a Filipina found in the freezer of an abandoned apartment in Kuwait and made a plea to Gulf states to treat his countrymen with dignity. ...

During a Manila-bound flight from Dubai on Saturday, an Indian passenger was detained and banned from entering the Philippines after he “manifested drunken behavior” on board the aircraft. According to a Khaleej Times article, the Cebu Pacific crew reported the passenger, Kalathiparamba Kunjipappu Sarinkumar, to the Philippine immigration bureau. He also disturbed other passengers on Flight 5J15 , they added. Upon being taken to the transfer desk at Ninoy Aquino International Airport ...